Questions also posted on the TRAINS Steam and Preservation Forum
Did the Central’s management ever consider streamlining a Niagra?
What drag freight power did the NYC have? Saw and/or rode behind Hudsons, Pacifics, Mikados, Berkshires, Switchers, B&A 4-6-4T’s, Ten Wheelers, and possibly Consolidations and Moguls, but I don’t remember any Decopads, Sante Fe Types, or any articulateds. Were there any? And the Central did have some mountain lines in coal fields.
No. I saw a sketch of a 4-4-4-4 duplex type which looks very similar to the Niagara, but had - I believe - a small skirt. That’s all. This was only a sketch, and only the Niagara has been built. I never found any efforts to streamline - even only some parts - a Niagara.
NYC did own some articulateds. These were 2-6-6-2s and 0-8-8-0s I believe. But they were used only for hump yard service, not on the road. Except the line you have mentioned and Albany to West Albany NYC was entirely a flat land system - perhaps that’s why they thought it is cheaper to use a pusher engine out of the already existent ones than to invent an entirely new class only for a few miles of track.
Thanks. I hope someday someone publishes that sketch!
I’ve only seen the proposed NYC duplex as a locomotive diagram style drawing. It’s been published in several sources. However, and I’m going way out on the recall limb for this, I believe I saw a 4-4-4-4 sketch, 3/4 front view, with a styling job reminicent of Kuhler’s B&O pacifics (the early ones). Had wings on either side of the centered headlight and a bullet nose. It wasn’t for NYC and may have been for T&P. Anyone else remember this or is it a figment of my imagination?
VAPEURCHAPLEON this is not a true statement. The New York Central had a line that extended from southeastern Ohio into the West Virginia coal fields. Or should I say the mountains and valleys of West Virginia.
There’s a side-view sketch and preliminary diagram with dimensions of the NYC C-1a Duplex in “New York Central’s Later Power” by Staufer. It looks very similar to a Niagra, which were very clean-lined locos with few external pipes and elephant ear smoke lifters. The top of the smokebox, boiler, and cab on the Niagra’s was virtually a straight line because of clearances on the NYC.
The 10 USRA 2-10-2’s have been mentioned in another post. These were used on the B&A, later tansfered to the Big Four, and in 1927 were sold to the GTW where they became #4200-4209.
Freight power in later years on the NYC was largely handled by Mohawks, many built for this service with 69" drivers. The later L-4a’s and b’s had 72" drivers and were built as dual purpose locos as were the Niagra’s. An interesting comment on not building the Duplex in the book was the Niagras were already hauling everything the road could couple behind them.
Found it. The 4-4-4-4 I referred to earlier was a Baldwin proposal, not lettered for any particular railroad. See Pennsy Power III, pg 203, bottom. Don’t know where I got T&P.
That division of the NYC was known officially as the Toledo & Ohio Central. It ran down from Columbus into WV, and then all the way up the north bank of the Kanawha River into the coal fields, terminating in a short line known as the Nicholas, Fayette & Greenbrier. The NFG was a joint NYC/C&O operation. NYC’s lighter mikados were the standard power on T&OC, which was also shared with the Virginian from Deepwater, WV to Charleston. Now and then the VGN would run one of its larger articulateds (but never an Allegheny) downriver into Charleston, but that was as far as they ever went.
For the record, T&OC is still there, now a part of NS. It still moves a fair amount of coal, and perhaps a fair number of automobiles as well since an auto assembly plant is now located on the lower Kanawha. I think it’s a Toyota plant but I’m not sure.
Ok ok, a third graded line on an otherwise flat system of several tens of thousands of track miles. But have many thanks - I never learn enough.
There was another line in eastern Ohio that NYC operated called the LEA&W - Lake Erie Alliance & Wheeling. This line ran from Dillonvale to Phalanx Jct. It was primarily a slow, coal hauling railroad that used 2-6-6-2’s as standard power. These were of the NE-2 class. This was a 20 mph. RR. SOmetimes the NE-2’s were doubleheaded.
Rick F. in Eastern Ohio
Stanley yard in Toledo is/was the northern terminal for the TOC…south of the Ohio river the TOC was called the K&M or the Kanawha and Michigan and it did pull a large amount of coal outa WV